Michael Haneke's production of Così fan tutte opened in March 2013 at Teatro Real in Madrid. The set by Christopher Kanter and costumes by Moidele Bickel mingled the spirit of Watteau with the spirit of Armani, a mixture that managed to look simultaneously inevitable and sinister.
Haneke invented a new relationship for Don Alfronso and Despina (William Shimell and Kerstin Avemo) as an embittered couple of the older generation in silvery satins of the Ancien Regime. In a filmed interview, Haneke compared the Watteau couple to George and Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, playing "get the guest" against the two naive younger couples.
Production photos by Javier del Real.